


belonging

by orphan_account



Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: F/M, Gajeel centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-16
Updated: 2016-01-16
Packaged: 2018-05-14 07:23:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5734639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>for the first time, he belongs</p>
            </blockquote>





	belonging

He’s been abandoned so often, by the time he joins Fairy Tail he’s genuinely worried that something might be wrong with him. Because there _has_ to be something fucked up about him that repels him from practically everyone he meets.

His birth mother, he’s told, lasted about five months before she dumped him on the steps of an orphanage. He spends the first five years of his life hating her, and the next fifteen hating himself. 

The orphanage chews him up and spits him out before he even turns twelve, and he’s left roaming the wilderness, stealing and begging for food. He meets Metalicana four days after his twelfth birthday and for a while, he allows himself to think that his luck has _finally_ changed. Somebody wants him, somebody _actually_ wants him. He doesn’t care that the person who wants him isn’t really a person and is instead a grumpy, 20 foot dragon, who eats iron. For once in his life, someone _actually_ wants him.

And then Metalicana disappears - fucking _abandons_ him - and he’s reminded that he is Gajeel Redfox, the boy _nobody_ wants. 

After that, it’s kind of like one giant downhill spiral. 

He’s homeless again, and he’s spent so much time with a goddamn dragon he’s kind of forgotten how to interact with _normal_ society. So he spends the first year and a half after losing Metalicana in a jail cell. 

It’s not that bad. He has a room and regular food to eat after all.

But after the year and a half is over, his sentence is up and he’s tossed back outside. 

He joins Phantom shortly after. 

José is a fucking _creep_ who makes his skin crawl and his guildmates aren’t much better, but he needs the money so he does what he has to do to get by. 

For a while, he tries to convince himself that Phantom are his new family. Because that’s what guilds are supposed to be, right? Family? Your guildmates are supposed to have your back, they’re supposed to watch out for you and keep you safe. Right?

He learns pretty quickly that’s not the case at Phantom. You look out for yourself and hope nobody else gets in your way. 

After a few months there, he decides it’s better that way. 

He’s tired, so _tired_ , of getting his hopes up. Tired of wondering if one day he might for somewhere where he belongs. He’s sick of dreaming about finding someone, _anyone_ , who might actually want him. 

So he gives up.

He shuts himself off from the world and becomes someone he doesn’t really recognise. 

But it’s better that way. It _easier_ that way. Because if he has to admit to himself one more time that he actually _cares_ about being wanted and alone, he’s not sure he’ll survive. 

A few years down the line he gets into trouble with the council and Belno tries to set him on the straight and narrow, but by that point he’s too far gone to realise that someone is _finally_ reaching out to him. 

They go to war with the fairies shortly after that and he does some a shit - a _lot_ of shit - he’s not proud of. He does things that will haunt his nightmares for _years_ afterwards. By the time Salamander lands the final blow and he’s sent flying through the air, he’s actually _glad_ they’ve stopped him. Because he’s finally seen a glimpse of what he’s become over the years, and he doesn’t like it. 

Not at _all_. 

He doesn’t deserve their kindness, but Makarov seeks him out anyway and extends a hand towards him.

It’s not easy at first. The fairies don’t trust him, not that he blames them. He’s not even sure he trusts himself. But he wants to try because he wants to change. He isn’t entirely sure how, but he figures joining the fairies is the best place to start. 

He finds acceptance (though it’s painfully hesitant) in the most unlikely place.

He finds it in one person he wouldn’t hold it against to never speak to him again. She frightened, so obviously frightened, but she makes a point to smile at him or wave or include him in conversations, and it _breaks his fucking heart_.

He doesn’t deserve any of the hospitality Makarov has given to him, but he most _certainly_ doesn’t deserve any kindness from _her_. 

And yet she gives it. 

Her two friends, rightfully, take longer to come around. But bizarrely they _do_ and one day, after all that mess on Tenrou, he finds them trailing after him on a mission.

They do it three times before he finally decides to ask Lily if he knows what the _hell_ is going on. Lily just shakes his head and smirks, as if he’s enjoying some big secret. 

Eventually, it becomes pretty normal for Jet and Droy to tag along with him on missions and he doesn’t even question it. 

Sometimes Levy will come with them, but when she doesn’t, she always says the same thing: “Look after my boys, Gajeel.”

He doesn’t even consider that she might be counting _him_ as one of those boys, until one days she tells him she does. 

It takes a while for him to get used to it. But eventually he does.  _He_ , Gajeel-frickin-Redfox, is one of _her_ boys.

He doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to it, if he’s honest with himself. 

Eventually, they become more than _just_ friends, he’s not sure when it happens but one day he finds himself unable to let her go and _everything_ changes. 

Jet and Droy and Lily don’t stop smiling for about a week. 

It’s then, and _only_ then, that he begins to wonder if his luck is finally changing. But he doesn’t dare utter it out loud because he knows only too well how the universe has a funny way of snatching things away from him when he feels happy.

“Gajeel?”

He blinks, her voice snapping him out of his thoughts. She’s raising an eyebrow at him, a look of concern mixed with bemusement crossing her features.

“Did you hear what I said?”

He nods slowly, his gaze lowering until it rests on the hand that is cradling her stomach. It’s still flat, but it won’t be long before she begins to show. 

“I’m going to be a father?”

She grins an impossibly bright grin, and he can feel the tears beginning to fall, “yes, yes you are.”

He pulls her in close, the tears falling freely now but, for quite possibly the first time in his life, they’re happy tears.

Screw the universe. 

It’s taken a while, and it hasn’t been an easy journey, but he’s finally, _finally,_ found his place where he belongs and he isn’t going to let that change.

**Author's Note:**

> this was a request on tumblr


End file.
